Úna’s Batch-Cooking Tips

I buy all the ingredients on my batch-cooking shopping list, except for tamari and occasionally tofu, in Aldi . It just happens to be the closest budget supermarket. Based on a quick gawk, Lidl is probably just as good.

Ask at the supermarket what days and times they get their deliveries of veg, plus what time they usually get the veg on display, and schedule your food-shopping accordingly. I find frozen spinach sells out really quick in Aldi… us Galwegians are more health-conscious than we give ourselves credit for 🙂

I found out the hard way that bags of frozen vegetables leak water. My kitchen is quite small, and I couldn’t figure out a place to put the voluminous bags of frozen vegetables until it was time to cook them. My (kinda wacky) solution is … I put them in my shower!! It’s a bit mad, but it means I don’t have puddles of water in my apartment – always nice. ! 😉

Cooking devices with timers are crucial. Confession: I choose to steam, grill and microwave food, not for reasons of health or taste, but … because my steamer, grill and microwave have timers. I fill them up, then go off and do nerdy musical things!

How many big mixing bowls do you have? That, plus the size of your cooking devices, will dictate how many recipes you make at once. I have 2 big mixing bowls, so I make 2 recipes at once.

You’ll have to experiment to find out to how big a batch you can comfortably cook with the space, devices and cookware available to you. Based on the size of my frying pan, steamer, and 2 mixing bowls, I find it’s best if I stick to cooking batches of 8 portions at a time. (I’ve tried 16 – it got a bit messy. !)

What’s your cooking plan? Well, the fact that all the ingredients of a meal don’t have to arrive on a table at the same time means you don’t really need one! For time-efficiency, I try to have all devices in the kitchen working simultaneously – e.g. have tofu marinading, vegetables steaming, potatoes microwaving, rice simmering, fresh veg grilling, and something frying all at once. Once an ingredient is ready, I put it in a big mixing bowl dedicated to that recipe. When all ingredients are ready and in the bowl, I mix it all together.

I originally tried dividing portions by weight – I found that very time-consuming. Now I mix / put the whole mixture into a rectangular-shaped receptacle, flatten it a bit, then divide the rectangle roughly into the appropriate amount of portions with a sharp knife. I then ladle each portion into a …

resealable freezer bag, which is more space-efficient than a freezer container. After use, I wash each bag and re-use.